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Final Copy 288 Ga. 687

S11A0346. SCARBOROUGH et al. v. HUNTER et al.

MELTON, Justice. This case involves a dispute over the potential abandonment of Winding Bluff Road by Stephens County and its Board of Commissioners.1 The road was accepted by the County as a public road in 2007, but, by 2010, the County had decided to initiate statutory abandonment procedures. On July 2, 2010, the Board sent out notice that it intended to hold an abandonment hearing regarding Winding Bluff Road on July 27, 2010. On July 19, 2010, a number of landowners2 along Winding Bluff Road filed a complaint for a writ of mandamus, asking that the County be forced to repair and maintain Winding Bluff Road as a public road. The landowners also requested a temporary

The members of the Board of Commissioners are C. Dean Scarborough, Stanley London, Jonesy Haygood, Harold Andrews, and J. B. Hudgins. All are named as defendants in the underlying action.
1

These landowners, who are the plaintiffs in the underlying action, include Jason Hunter, K-M Development Corporation, James Sellers, and Judy Medlin.
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restraining order to prevent the Board from having a public meeting to further consider abandonment of the road. These property owners contended that Winding Bluff Road had been severely damaged by flooding in 2008 and 2009, that the County had improperly neglected its duty to repair the damage to the road, and that, to further evade this duty, the County intended to abandon the road.3 The property owners also argued that, if the County were allowed to abandon the road, their property values would be greatly diminished. The day before the Board's scheduled abandonment hearing, the trial court entered a temporary restraining order against the Board, preventing it from holding a hearing or taking a vote on abandonment. We granted the Board's application for interlocutory appeal positing the following question: "Did the trial court err by issuing a temporary restraining order preventing the Board of Commissioners from exercising its discretion regarding the abandonment of Winding Bluff Road? See OCGA

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